LETTER FROM MELBOURNE

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LETTER FROM MELBOURNE 1 AUGUST TO 4 SEPTEMBER involved in this redevelopment. The Age said that Tabcorp are believed to be worried the machines will be decommissioned, giving rival operator Tattersall’s the opportunity to increase its machines in the area. Inquiry into gaming/Bracks Former Premier Steve Bracks denies any improper interference in the awarding of Victoria’s lucrative gaming licence. Former Tattersall’s trustees Peter Kerr and Ray Hornsby, and former chief executive Duncan Fischer, appeared at the parliamentary inquiry into the matter and also told the media their version of events. Tattersall’s backflipped, according to The Age, over its relationship with former government minister and lobbyist David White, saying he would have got a ‘success fee’ if the company’s lotteries licence were renewed.. HealH Teachers, Police and … The likelihood of nurses striking in public hospitals has increased, as nurses union wants a pay rise of 6 per cent a year for the next three years, but the government is sticking to 3.25 per cent over five years, according to The Age. Nurses’ claims to a greater increase (like those of police and teachers) have gained further weight since Bureau of Statistics figures revealed this month that Victorian wages are growing more slowly than anywhere else in Australia. States’ budget challenge The states (all of them) will have to cover an extra $2.7b this year as federal funding fails to keep up with the costs of running the public health system, the Financial Review said. Smoke rings shrinking Following the strict smoking bans in bars, phone calls to Quitline have increased by 27 per cent The Age said. Anti-tobacco body Quit Victoria’s next frontier is smoking in cars with children present. A Cancer Council Victoria survey showed an overwhelming (but surely unsurprising) 95 per cent of Victorians find smoking in a car when a child is present unacceptable. 90 per cent of Victorian smokers agreed. Anti tobacco groups criticised the Federal Government decision to allow cigarette company Phillip Morris launch Australia’s first electronic smoking device, arguing the device should be rigorously tested before it is put on the market, The Age reported. Junk the ads VicHealth has become the first government authority in Australia to call for a ban on junk food advertising targeted at children, The Age said. Rise in birth rate The Royal Women’s Hospital, redesigned (in a time of falling birth rates) is now unable to deal with a massive rise in births. The hospital, along with the other major maternity hospitals (Mercy Hospital for Women and Monash Medical Centre), will direct women with uncomplicated pregnancies to their local suburban hospitals according to The Age. Fall in birth rate The Royal Women’s Hospital has been given approval by health authorities to prescribe the controversial abortion pill RU486. 18 months after a conscience vote removed the health minister’s right to veto the drug and placed the power of approval in the hands of the Therapeutic Goods Administrator the hospital has become the first in Australia to be given permission to use the drug, The Age said. Stronger springs Ambulances specially equipped to deal with morbidly obese patients will soon hit the street of Melbourne. The $200,000 extra-large vehicles will have a special hydraulic lift, extra sturdy stretchers etc., and will be capable of carrying patients who weigh up to 450kg, The Herald Sun said. Coleman criticises cuts Head of Monash Medical Centre’s adolescent medical unit, Jacinta Coleman criticised the lack of funding for services to help children with anorexia saying it could cost lives, The Age said. A sharp increase in the number of young girls suffering from anorexia has forced the Children’s Hospital to close its doors to new patients (putting extra pressure on other hospitals). Admissions among girls aged 10 to 13 increased from three in 2003 to 43 last year. Fatal flu Health authorities are investigating whether flu killed a five-year-old Berwick boy, The Herald Sun said. A 95-year-old man died and fifty others are ill due to an outbreak of gastroenteritis at a South Morang nursing home, The Age reported. Health Services Review Council The Department of Human Services is calling for expressions of interest for the Health Services Review Council. The Council is made up of three members to represent each of health providers, users, unaffiliated, and others with health information experience. www.health.vic.gov.au/hsc/ resources/hsrc.htm. Invese Business Market splash At the beginning of August, the Australian sharemarket suffered its greatest one-day fall ($47b) since the September 11. The losses are the ripple effects of the sharp decline in the values of higherrisk US mortgage investments, which is affecting economies around the world, The Age reported. Central banks around the world were on crisis watch ready to pump additional liquidity into financial markets, the Financial Review reported. An Age BusinessDay headline said unforgiving investors continued to lash Macquarie Bank, fearing the mortgage market’s effects here. RAMS Home Loans Group warned they may suffer a drop in profits due to the ‘rising cost of raising money in the volatile offshore markets’, The Age reported. However the US Federal Reserve’s emergency decision to ‘cut its discount rate to head off further deterioration in global credit markets’ bolstered confidence in Australia and elsewhere, the Financial Review said. Emission trading accountability CPA Australia, one of thee major accounting bodies in Australia, has warned that ‘an emissions trading scheme could cause significant financial reporting and assurance issues’. David Boymal, chairman of the Australian Accounting Standards Board, and Merran Kelsall, chair of the Auditing and Assurance Standards Board, responded in the Financial Review. Boymal chastised the accounting standardsetter, suggesting that it is inappropriate for such a body to discuss solutions before the details of the scheme are made known. Kelsall said the AUASB will asses the suitability of its current standards to accommodate assurance engagements involving reporting on emissions trading data, but also noted that Australia and the rest of the world will in the long term develop a specific regulatory and reporting system and specific assurance standards for emissions trading reporting. Corrigan says nonsense The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission began legal proceedings against a group of companies and individuals including former Patrick Corp managing director Chris Corrigan, alleging price fixing in the stevedoring industry, the Financial Review said. Sun rise, sun set Labor has called on the Federal Government to review its Greenhouse Challenge Plus program that attempts to encourage businesses to cut greenhouse gas emissions. The number of companies involved in the program has declined over the last year, the Financial Review said. Not all greenhouse news this month was bleak. Voluntary carbon trading, through the Australian Climate Exchange, officially opened in Melbourne. Diversified telecommunications company M2 Telecommunications Company made the first purchase. The trading price was $8.50 a tonne. Carbon offsets can be banked, and used at a later date to offset emissions, according to the Financial Review. $$$ National Stock Exchange of Australia, owner of the Bendigo and Wollongong exchanges bought an independent water trading company and revealed plans to open a new board devoted to clean technology stocks, the Financial Review said. NSX (itself listed on the Australian Stock Exchange) believes there much scope in green trading. Bendigo and Adelaide Bank Limited will be the name of the two soon to be merged banks. New Jobs Wayne Kayler-Thomson, formerly of the Victorian Department of Innovation, Industry and Regional development, has been appointed chief executive of the Victorian Employers Chamber of Commerce and Industry. He said VECCI’s role has shifted from representing employers on industrial relations to providing leadership, information and other services, The Age reported. 14
1 AUGUST TO 4 SEPTEMBER LETTER FROM MELBOURNE Former Rio Tinto chief Leigh Clifford will become chairman of Qantas when Margaret Jackson stands down in November, The Age said. St George Bank’s Gail Kelly will become the Westpac Banking Corp’s new chief executive taking the reigns from David Morgan when he stands down before the end of the year, the Financial Review said. BlueScope Steel has named chief financial officer Paul O’Malley, 43, as chief executive taking over from Kirby Adams in November. Former Elders IXL boss John Dorman Elliot’s four year ban on company directorships (following the bankruptcy of Elders IXL) has ended, the Financial Review reported. Abalone disease Victoria’s abalone industry is strongly opposed to plans that would see quarantine restrictions eased. A deadly virus that is severely affecting the southwest coast, is believed to have come originally from a farm and now is ruining wild abalone reefs. The current laws say farmers may not discharge water, or transfer stock once a disease is detected, The Age reported. Business backs APEC The Federal Government sponsored Asia Pacific Economic Co-operation summit in Sydney includes the APEC Business Summit, a business summit for 400 executives sponsored by major companies. Temporary, and large barricades in the town have, according to one media source, created the ‘great wall of Sydney’. There is also an SME summit in Melbourne. Could burn a hole in your pocket The CFA and the MFB are running advertisements encouraging people to recognise the economic perils of failing to insure against damage from fire, and warning that the uninsured also risk having to pay ‘reasonable costs’ for firefighting services provided by the MFB or CFA. Energetic business speakers As Part of Victoria’s Small Business Festival there was an energetic business speaker series throughout August including speakers Tim Pethick, founder of Nudie Juice, and Adam Genovese of Genovese Coffee, see business.vic.gov.au/energise. The festival’s main event was the APEC Business Advisory Council’s Small and Medium Sized Enterprise Summit held in Melbourne. Another Cairns Group forum Labor industry spokesman Kim Carr, following his calls for greater protection for the car industry, has Help Keep Australia Beautiful Victoria & support community volunteers on important local environmental challenges as a Corporate Supporter. Become a Corporate Supporter! Your sponsorship of $1000 will go to KABV support of your preferred local environmental challenge. contact KABV p. 03 9484 2399 www.kabv.org.au suggested Melbourne become host to a ‘Melbourne Innovation Group of Nations’ to help smaller countries compete against world leaders (such as the US) by becoming more innovative, The Age reported. i Australia’s IT infrastructure A recent survey by American groups Business Software Alliance and the Economist Intelligence Unit ranked Australia’s information technology infrastructure as one of the best in the world but also said Australia needs to invest more money in research. Australia ranked fifth over all out of the 64 nations included in the study, The Herald Sun said. State’s supply The State Government has begun its procurement process to choose companies to supply about $90m worth of back-office computer equipment over the next five years. The current arrangement was undertaken by the Department of Human Services, with provisions for common access. Most other departments have taken advantage of the agreement, which will end December 31. There has been speculation that Victoria will return control of technology purchasing to individual departments, however the DHS tender documents make it clear the purchasing initiative has provisions for other departments, the Australian Review reported. Multimedia Victoria update A few interesting things are going on in the Information and Communication Technology industry at the moment, including the Victorian Government’s latest research into young people’s attitudes to ICT study and careers; exciting developments in the Victorian spatial information industry; and State Government programs encouraging rural teens to move into a career in ICT; www.mmv.vic.gov.au. The need for speed Dr Phil Burgess, group managing director, Public Policy and Communications at Telstra, spoke on 16 August at the Australian Information Industry Association’s Victorian business briefing. He told the forum how Telstra’s high-speed broadband solution can be good for information industry, and why it is so important for Australia’s economy. Agriculure Farmers reap rewards Extending global positioning system technology to cover most of Victoria’s grain farms could generate over $500m over 20 years, an Allen Consulting Group study found. Farmers can use the GPS technology to seed and harvest crops with incredible accuracy, The Age reported. GM get go A ‘confidential’ Federal Government report says farmers should be allowed to begin growing genetically modified crops immediately, and that they pose no danger to human health or the environment, according to The Age. Federal agriculture minister Peter McGauran backed the report, but experts and environmentalists remain unconvinced. Killing method concerns The Victorian Farmers Federation has questioned a federal export regulator decision to allow a Warrnambool abattoir to ritually slaughter conscious animals for religious purposes. According to The Age industry sources say there is growing pressure from Jewish and Islamic export markets on Australian meat processors to kill animals without electrical stunning. Jusice Ethics of pay push Police voted to take industrial action to try to pressure the government into increasing the 3.25 per cent pay rise that they describe as ‘insulting’ The Herald Sun said. Chief Commissioner Christine Nixon told 3AW that she agreed that police should get a pay-rise, but could not endorse some of the work bans proposed by the Police Association. New blood Following in the footsteps of other Directors of Public Prosecutions Paul Coghlan, 63, has been promoted to judge of the Supreme Court. In one of his last acts as Victorian DPP Coghlan referred serious allegations of criminal behaviour by cigarette maker British American Tobacco and their Australian lawyers Clayton Utz to the nation’s top crime fighting body for a special investigation, The Age said. Attorney General Rob Hulls also appointed to the bench Ross Robson, QC, and John Forrest, QC. Judge Julie Dodds-Streeton has been elevated to the Victorian Court of Appeal. Cockfight fine Magistrate Donna Bakos fined Hung Truong, 31, $1000 for his part in a backyard cockfight late last year, The Herald Sun said. Hearts and minds Police Chief Commissioner Christine Nixon says focusing on winning the hearts and minds of alienated Islamic communities is a better way of fighting terrorism, and suggests the term ‘war on terror’ should be avoided, The Age said. Victoria Police is establishing a special team of 30 detectives 15
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